wrestling / Columns

Shining a Spotlight 10.04.07: The Phenemonal One and the Fallen Angel

October 4, 2007 | Posted by Michael Weyer

I know it sounds like I’ve been down on TNA in my columns as of late. It’s not that I hate the company really. In fact, I was a big champion for it not that long back. What I hate is seeing TNA go from a true alternative to WWE to emulating it, acting like they’re bigger than they are and ignoring the fanbase they built to cater to the one they want. It hardly helps that they are giving massive pushes to ex-WWE guys from Kurt Angle to Christian to Rikishi right off the bat while ignoring the home-grown talent that helped put them on the map in the first place. It’s that attitude that deserves attention this week as TNA is now reaching criminal status with their ignoring two men who should not be ignored. Two men who helped build this company up, two excellent workers who have shown true loyalty to TNA and have been majorly over with the fans. Two men who should be the ones getting some pushes but are lost in the shuffle.

AJ Styles and Christopher Daniels.

Since TNA began, they have been two of the prime stars, especially Styles. He’s proven from the start that he can work an excellent match with his stunning aerial abilities and technical moves. It’s because of Styles that the X Division worked and he’s kept it going since. He’s also majorly over with the fans, even as a heel. Daniels was stuck for a while in tag team work but when he got his shot at singles stardom, he proved he could make it work as the longest-reigning X Division champion of all time. Each man has proven he can carry the company and a title well and the fans could back them up.

And yet despite all the achievements in TNA, and in ROH as well, Styles and Daniels today are relegated to small bits. Daniels barely shows up, stuck with XXX while Styles has been reduced to the comic relief idiot lackey of Christian. And of course, both are being kept down from the main title scene, a scene each is capable of holding well. Rather than reward them for their loyalty to stay with TNA and see how the fans would like them, TNA management is content to push guys who have been over for years with another company. As I said, it’s a shame that TNA won’t give those guys the chance they deserve but it’s also a sign of the problems the promotion has.

As I said, it’s all the more stunning considering how huge both men have been ever since TNA started. I got into TNA because of AJ Styles. Ever since I first caught him on the old FSN Impact shows, I have been a major follower of Styles’ work. It’s amazing considering that he hasn’t even been in the business for a decade but is still…well, phenomenal, in the ring. The way he moves, how he takes to the air so easily and is willing to do some insane bumps and leaps makes him a standout. He’s also a terrific seller, able to work an injury like nobody’s business and making it totally believable as well. The fact he’s still improving makes it all the more remarkable.

Getting Styles so early was one of the single best moves TNA ever made. He had been around for a while in NWA Wildside and was just getting his start in WCW when the company went under. He showed up a few times on WWF TV fighting the Hurricane but was lost in the mass confusion of that time, turning down an offer from WWF since it would interfere with his wife’s college plans. He would continue to work with Wildside for a few years on and off but of course, TNA was what was calling for him.

I have to admit to looking forward to TNA’s upcoming “Year 1” DVD to show how the promotion had to fight to establish themselves. The X Division was their first really great idea, to create somewhere for more top-notch athletes than usual. He debuted on that first weekly PPV where he, Jerry Lynn and Low-Ki suffered the indignity of losing to the Flying Elvises so his career could really only go up from there. On the second ever TNA PPV, he defeated Lynn, Low-Ki and Psychosis in a double-elimination match to become the first-ever X Division champion and immediately set out making this newly created title a respected one with matches against all comers that soon became highlights of those first shows. He also teamed with Lynn to win the NWA Tag Team titles, holding them for a bit before they split. The next few years would see Styles go from heel to face, ally with Vince Russo and fight him while managing to score the NWA World title, the tag titles again with Abyss (although they would be stripped of them for non-defenses) and winning the X Division belt a couple more times. At the first three-hour PPV “Victory Road” he and Petey Williams had a short but good matchup.

2005 would see Styles shoot to the big time in TNA kicking off by winning the X Division title for the fourth time in the best-ever Ultimate X match at “Final Resolution.” He would eventually drop it in March but in April he and Abyss would have the main event at “Lockdown,” a cage battle with Styles doing some amazing stuff like leaping through the open cage door to plancha Abyss, be tossed to the guardrail only to slide under the rail and then attack Abyss and be tossed over again but leap into the crowd, off a riser and hit his opponent with a flying forearm. After winning the wild battle, he’d beat Jeff Jarrett for the NWA title at “Hard Justice,” the crowd going nuts for his victory. However, reportedly, Styles wanted to do more with the X Division so he dropped the belt at Slammiversery and went to concentrating on winning the X title back. He capped it off with losing the belt to Samoa Joe in a terrific match that solidified Joe as a star in TNA.

Styles wasn’t the only one whose star rose huge with TNA in 2005. Christopher Daniels had been bouncing around the scene for a while, making his debut for Windy City Wrestling in 1994. He would work with the indies for a while, making a brief foray into the big times as one of the Conquistadors in WWF in 2000 and made an appearance with WCW before it went under. He debuted with TNA a few weeks after they started up, soon forming XXX with Elix Skipper and Low-Ki. They would win the tag titles with two of them defending at any time. Low-Ki would soon leave with Skipper and Daniels having an epic feud with America’s Most Wanted, highlighted by losing the tag belts to AMW in a steel cage match universally recognized as the best TNA match of 2003. The feud would pick up in 2004 with the unique idea that with Chris Harris injured, Skipper was ordered to team with James Storm to beat the Naturals for the tag team titles. Both Harris and Daniels were angered so Larry Zybsko, then acting as a big TNA official, ordered these two mismatched teams to face each other with Daniels and Harris winning the belts. They’d drop them to Team Canada and the AMW-XXX feud would pick back up immediately. At “Victory Road” ’04, they’d face off in a wild match and then steal the show completely at “Turning Point” in the classic bloody steel cage match with the stip that XXX would have to split forever.

Now free in the singles ranks, Daniels quickly started to rise in the X Division with several top notch matches. He and Styles would face off at “Against All Odds ‘05” in a 30-minute Iron Man match that ended with each tied at one fall as time ran out. Daniels demanded sudden death only to lose. At “Destination X,” he’d survive the somewhat convoluted Ultimate Challenge match to win the X Division title. While his win was a bit tainted (Styles had grabbed the belt from the X but the ref was knocked out so Daniels laid Styles out and grabbed the belt for himself), Daniels quickly elevated himself with the fans with one great matchup after another. At “Lockdown,” he faced off against Skipper in a great “former partners turned enemies” battle to retain the belt. At “Hard Justice,” he beat Mexican star Shocker and at “Slammiversary,” he came out on top against Matt Bentley and Chris Sabin in a match notable for Daniels giving Trinity the Angel’s Wings. “No Surrender” saw him facing Williams in a nice heel vs heel match I covered in a column last year and “Sacrifice” had him beating Austin Aries in a special fan’s challenge match. His record six-month reign as X Division champ finally came to an end at the classic three-way with Styles and Joe at “Unbreakable.”

After losing, Daniels and Styles would beef up the first few Impact shows on Spike by building up their Iron Man rematch at “Bound for Glory.” Then at “Genesis,” after accidentally hitting Joe during an elimination match, Daniels was brutally laid out by Joe to sell him as a monster. Daniels would return to challenge Joe, coming up short at “Final Resolution ‘06” and again in the three way rematch at “Against All Odds ‘06” but win it back in an Ultimate X match at “Destination X ’06.” However, in what would actually be the focus of my very first column, he jobbed the title back to Joe only weeks later. He still remained quite over with the fans with his great technical work, bringing a cocky air to his in-ring style and was terrific on the mic.

So naturally, putting Styles and Daniels together as a tag team was a brilliant move on TNA’s part. They started a series of great bouts with AMW, culminating in winning the tag titles at “Slammiversary” in a terrific battle that the crowd went nuts for. They seemed in for a long reign but ended up trading the belts back and forth with LAX, losing in a “Border City Brawl” but winning them back in the first tag team Ultimate X match then finally losing back to LAX in a cage match at “BFG.” Then they were split as Styles won the X Division title for a record sixth time only for Daniels to end up with the belt in a three way matchup, losing it to Sabin at this year’s “Final Resolution.”

Now one would think that with such a wide body of work, with multiple title reigns and excellent ring work, with huge fan approval and showing loyalty by staying with TNA, Styles and Daniels would get some good pushes from the company still. At least, you’d expect them to give these guys some decent character work. Instead, both men have been struggling with stuff that really doesn’t work for them and it’s not only slowed their progress but hurt their standing with TNA fans and made the entire promotion look a bit weaker.

Let’s talk about Styles first. Turning him heel was good even if it seemed a bit weak with the feud with Rhino that seemed to be over nothing serious. Still, a heel turn seemed to work well as AJ has always had that natural arrogance to himself and that could help his ring work. Moving on to working with Christian seemed to be good too, a natural partnership that could elevate them further. But then the problems came with AJ pushed down and made more of a lackey. Then the really bad move as suddenly, Styles was turned into a complete idiot on camera, forgetting obvious things, bumbling like one of the Ritz Brothers and letting Christian push him around. For years, Styles was presented as a brilliant worker because of his quick wits and rings smarts so suddenly dumbing him down makes no sense at all. Also, for so long, Styles has been presented as a leader and an independent person, with multiple “Mr. TNA” awards recognizing that. Now, the AJ Styles who shows up on “Impact” today is a totally different person and one that, while good in the ring still, doesn’t have that same quality of “gotta see this” as he once had and that hurts the matches he has.

At least Styles has some sort of presence on Impact which is more than you can say for Daniels. When he came back, it seemed interesting with his beard and the tribal-like face paint, attacking Sting and having a more religious like attitude. The idea of him trying to be a disciple for Sting and then turning on him seemed good as Daniels always had that religious aspect to his character and this would be a good way to build him up. But just as it was about to take off, the whole thing was ended with Daniels pushed down the card a bit. Now, TNA seems to be doing a time warp with Daniels back with XXX and while he seems to be a contender for the X Division title, he has also seemed to lose some of the intense aura he had that made him so watchable in 2005. While Daniels can be a great heel, he just doesn’t seem as commanding as before which is hurting him. They’re also not giving him enough mic time which is bad because the guy really has awesome charisma on the stick and has turned in great promos to push his matches and show his arrogant character to its full effect.

That TNA is letting two men who have done so much for the company slide like this is pretty appalling. It’s more amazing considering how huge they are with puro fans, thanks to their work in ROH. Hell, Daniels is one of the founding fathers of ROH, putting himself on the map in the very first ROH show when he broke the Code of Honor by refusing to shake Bryan Danielson’s hand. That started a feud between them with Daniels carrying himself as better than ROH which led to several great battles and winning the tag team titles while forming his own heel group, the Prophecy. He would leave in 2004 when TNA freaked over one of ROH’s video distributors arrested for soliciting an underage boy online and cut off ties with ROH.

Daniels would return to ROH in 2005, challenging CM Punk for the ROH title when Punk threatened to go to WWE with it. He and Punk would have several great matches like a one hour draw at “The Homecoming” and would be part of an elimination match for the belt but would end up accidentally eliminating Samoe Joe. He would win the tag belts once more before officially leaving the company for TNA.

Styles also has had long runs with ROH, showing up at their third show and quickly becoming a main eventer, holding the trophy as the Number One Contender (considered a secondary title with ROH at the time). He and the Amazing Red would win the ROH tag titles and would be the first Pure Wrestling Champion. He would be much the same character and acted as a mentor to Jimmy Rave. However, he too would be forced to leave due to TNA cutting ties over that online scandal and would be forced to vacate the belt. While he was gone, Rave turned heel and started to use the Styles Clash finisher, which he called the Rave Clash, claiming that AJ stole it from him. Styles would return to feud with Rave and have great matches with the likes of Danielson, Punk and Joe but be unable to win the title before breaking off with ROH for TNA.

So with ROH, Styles and Daniels have the massive respect of pure wrestling fans and have proven themselves great workers. In TNA, they have been with the company since the very beginning, working weekly shows to push the promotion and doing their best to give TNA the big rub to boost the company. They each helped make the X Division the showcase it is with Styles holding the belt more times than anyone and Daniels the longest-reigning titleholder. Styles also helped carry the NWA and tag team titles and Daniels was a great tag champion too. Moreover, each is incredibly over with TNA fans and have been recognized as major faces of the company, two home-grown talents who stand as proof TNA doesn’t need to rely on WWE castoffs to succeed.

Unfortunetly, TNA themselves seem to not hold that attitude. Rather than recognize the power Styles and Daniels have and keep on pushing them, TNA is satisfied to let them stew on the backburner for Pacman, Angle and Sting. Not only that, they’re also giving the two men characters that don’t suit them and even take away from the great charisma they had earlier. Selling Styles as such an idiotic tool goes against everything he was showing in the ring only a year ago. Daniels is bouncing between a fanatic and suddenly a low-rent Flair pushing XXX as his own lackeys to back him up. In each case, TNA is failing to properly utilize someone who has proven they can carry the main event scene, a title and the adulation of fans. Styles could still take it to either the X Division or the main event title scene while Daniels is long overdue for a run at the TNA title. Plus, they’re two incredibly gifted workers who can elevate almost anyone being in the ring with them. Hell, they helped make LAX a truly formidable tag team with their feud and each has helped boost plenty of singles stars. You think it was just coincidence that when Jeff Hardy joined TNA, they had him face Styles first? It got Hardy over great with the crowd and helped boost his entrance with the company. Daniels is also capable of making anyone shine in the ring against him with even better charisma than Styles on the mic.

But TNA is keeping down these two men who helped put the company on the map in the first place and were the poster boys for the terrific in-ring work TNA emphasized. I understand that TNA wants a few more high profile guys to make themselves big for national TV. But Styles and Daniels have proven they can be major stars for this company and the fans have backed that feeling up. To push two such talents down the card after all they’ve done and give them poor characters while pushing long-over stars like Angle and Sting is a bad move for morale in TNA. There are already grumblings over how the guys who helped build the company are being ignored for ex-WWE stars. Seeing two men who were two of the best founders of the promotion misused like that isn’t a good thing to help the locker room mentality. If TNA keeps up these poor pushes, Styles and Daniels may decide, loyalty or not, that it might be time to give ROH or even WWE a more permanent call. If they were to leave permanently, it would rob TNA of two of their best talents at a time when they need all the appeal from pure wrestling fans they can get. And that could be yet another massive misstep that could lead the company further down the trail to destruction. Christopher Daniels and AJ Styles were two reasons I, and I suspect many others, got hooked on TNA. Without them…well, I think a loss like that would be another bad sign for TNA’s overall future.

I know I sounded down here but that’s because it’s so aggravating to see two men who have turned in so many awesome matches being misused like this. Picking the best match involving both men is tough with their long records, including the two TNA Iron Man bouts and their tag work. But if you had to narrow it down to just one…well, I guess there’s only one real choice for their best.

Unbreakable, September 11, 2005. AJ Styles vs Samoa Joe vs Christopher Daniels. Three-way match for the X-Division Championship.

Daniels had just passed the record as the longest-reigning X Division champion and was on top of his game. Joe had defeated Styles at the previous month’s “Sacrifice” in the finals of the Super X Cup tournament to earn the title shot. However, Daniels had interfered to help Joe win and Styles was soon chasing after him. So, Larry Zybsko announced that it would be a three-way match for the title. For once, TNA showed some common sense by deciding this would be the main event of the PPV, figuring no other match could top it. All three men came out to high expectations to the crowd, with Daniels prophetically yelling “this will be my finest hour!”

In what I would have to put under the category of questionable strategy, Daniels started off the match by yelling at both guys over how it was his title and neither of them would take it. Styles and Joe responded by rushing Daniels with kicks and blows and then a series where Styles would forearm Daniels, sending him to Joe who’d chop him, back to Styles with another forearm, then Joe grabbed Daniels, snap-mared him and gave him a wicked kick along his back. Styles shoved Joe back, yelling “That’s not how you do it!” and laid his own kick to Daniels, turning to Joe to add “That’s how you do it!”. Joe shrugged as if saying “okay, not bad,” then kicked Daniels again. AJ shook his finger to launch another kick. The hysterical payoff came with Daniels leaping to his feet to yell out “STOP…KICKING ME!!” so naturally AJ kicked him in the back of the leg while Joe kicked him across the chest, sending him down to wild laughter and applause from the crowd.

After three attempted roll-ups by Styles, Joe locked him into a double-arm submission which was broken up by Daniels. He hit Joe with a back heel kick but fell victim to several chops and knocked through the ropes. Joe went to pound on AJ in the corner with Daniels re-entering, getting a bulldog on AJ and then running forward to kick Joe in the head while bull-dogging Styles. Joe would get Daniels into the corner and tried to whip Styles into him but Daniels moved, only to get whipped into Styles by Joe. Daniels tried the same bulldog but this time, AJ threw him forward, right into a powerslam by Joe. Styles then ran up for a spinning headscissors on Joe and kicking him in the corner, then ran across the ring with his flying forearm on Daniels. He ran back to Joe, only to be caught in an overhead suplex that landed him upside down in the turnbuckles. Joe was going to go for his running knee but Daniels caught him mid-way across the ring to send him out. Daniels raced through to dropkick Joe through the ropes, then bounced off the top for a moonsault on Joe. As they exchanged punches, Styles climbed to the top rope, leaped up and executed an incredible shooting star press onto both men.

Styles rolled Joe into the ring for a two-count, then hit him with a great dropkick for another two. Daniels attacked him, tossing him into the corner then going after Joe. What happened next is a move so incredible that words cannot properly convey how beautiful it was to watch. Daniels tried to whip Joe into Styles but Joe reversed it, Daniels leaping up to grab Styles and monkey flipped him back to Joe with Styles then nailing Joe with a huracarana. As I said, utterly amazing considering how seamless it was done in one fluid motion. Even better was Daniels’ expression as even he can’t believe that just happened. He went for a two on Styles, then rolled him out to attack Joe with slaps. That, of course, was a bad move as Joe nailed him back with several open-handed slaps and knees, Daniels rebounding with a roll-up but Joe managing to turn it into the Kokina Clutch.

As Daniels weakened, Styles leapt off the top with the Spiral Tap to break it up and get two on each man before being tossed out by Daniels. He then nailed Joe with a reverse STO and went for the BME but Style attacked him from behind, leaving him hanging upside down from the turnbuckle. Not one to pass up such an opportunity, Joe laid out Styles and then ran across the ring to cream the Fallen Angel with a savage dropkick to the face. After unhooking Daniels, Joe managed to catch Styles in an inverted atomic drop and a one-footed dropkick and a Senton backsplash for a near-fall. Daniels returned and managed to get Joe with the Death Valley Driver.

After a few moments of all three down, Styles tried to suplex Daniels but Daniels blocked it and lifted AJ over the ropes, the Phenomenal One managing to land on the apron only to eat an elbow. Daniels went for a slingshot plancha but Styles moved with Daniels landing on his feet, the two exchanging blows and we get the famous image of Joe running across the ring and, in a move incredible for a man his size, leaping over the top rope with a corkscrew dive to take out both men and get the crowd on yet another “Holy shit!” chant. Joe rolled Daniels in for Muscle Buster but Daniels fought him off while Styles climbed to the top rope. Daniels went to attack him as Joe came over and in another famous moment, hurled both men off with a double suplex that sent all three sprawling. Joe managed to duck a spinning backhand and a Pele Kick with Joe nailing him with a backdrop suplex and then the Muscle Buster. Before he could choke him out, Daniels entered with the X Division title belt with Joe power-slamming him then grabbing the belt and taunting Daniels with it. The ref grabbed the belt for a tug of war with Joe and Daniels kicked the belt into Joe’s face to send him out. He then went after Styles, thunder bombing him off the ropes and getting him with the STO and the BME but Joe recovered to break the count.

Daniels hit back with a kick and the Last Rites to lay him out of the ring once more. He went after Styles only to be hit with the springboard inverted DDT. AJ went to the ropes once more but Daniels met him for a superplex as the crowd’s “This is awesome!” chants grew even louder. Joe covered each for two and then power bombed Daniels who kicked out so Joe put him into an STF. Daniels managed to grab the rope to break it up so Joe went after AJ only to eat a Pele and get put into a torture rack and then a slam. Daniels slammed AJ on top of Joe but he bounced off to race to Daniels, catch him in a crucifix, a sunset flip and standing up to nail Daniels with the Styles Clash. Joe broke up the pin and tossed him out, charging at Daniels, who sidestepped and tossed Joe to the floor. Styles and Daniels went back to slugging it out, Daniels getting Styles into the Angel’s Wings, lifting him up but Styles managed to keep his balance, flipping Daniels onto his back, his arms hooked into a bridge as the referee counted to three and gave Styles his fifth X Division Championship.

The crowd erupted at the spectacle they witnessed as AJ held the belt high, Joe seethed outside and Daniels howled in agony over losing the belt. It was recognized universally as the best TNA match of 2005 and maybe even the best match of any promotion of that year. It elevated Joe big time in TNA and proved all three men could be main event level stars. It’s a shame that it’s the closest Daniels has gotten to that main event status while AJ and Joe seem unlikely to return to it anytime soon. At least all three can be satisfied with turning in one of the best wrestling matches seen in the last several years. One can hope TNA will give them more such chances soon.

Also around 411mania:

You’re an Idiot talks about the Divas.

Seventh Dimension asks if money is really that important to wrestlers.

Evolution Schematic continues its look at the Godfather.

Hitting Below the Beltway looks at who has the best title scene.

The Shimmy continues their look at HHH’s report card.

Viral Dose of Reality has an intriguing essay on Heyman’s influence on women in wrestling, good and bad.

Julian returns by counting down the Top 10 Announcers.

The Way I C It talks of how much better ROH is than TNA.

Piledriver Report looks at the possible return of Jericho.

Can They Be Champ welcomes back the suspended.

Pro Wrestling Pundit beats me to a column on the cycles of wrestling.

What Were they Thinking? talks about RAW.

Don’t forget Column of Honor, Cut to the Crap, Ask 411, Fact Or Fiction, Navigation Log, 3 R’s, Triple Threat and the rest.

Next week, I’ll do a special tenth anniversary retrospective on Hell in the Cell. For now, the spotlight is off.

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Michael Weyer

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